Oh! the old swimmin'-hole! Whare the crick so still and deep Looked like a baby-river that was laying half asleep, And the gurgle of the worter round the drift jest below Sounded like the laugh of something we onc't ust to know Before we could remember anything but the eyes Of the angels lookin' out as we left Paradise; But the merry days of Youth is beyond our controle, And it's hard to part ferever with the old swimmin'-hole. Oh! the old swimmin'-hole! In the happy days of yore, When I ust to lean above it on the old sickamore, Oh! it showed me a face in its warm sunny tide That gazed back at me so gay and glorified, It made me love myself, as I leaped to caress My shadder smilin' up at me with sich tenderness. But them days is past and gone, and old Time's tuck his toll From the old man come back to the old swimmin'-hole. Oh! the old swimmin'-hole! In the long, lazy days When the hum-drum of school made so many run-a-ways, How pleasant was the jurney down the old dusty lane, Whare the tracks of our bare feet was all printed so plane You could tell by the dent of the heel and the sole They was lots o' fun on hands at the old swimmin'-hole But the lost joys is past! Let your tears in sorrow roll Like the rain that ust to dapple up the old swimmin'-hole. Oh! the old swimmin'-hole! When I last saw the place, The scenes was all changed, like the change in my face; The bridge of the railroad now crosses the spot Whare the old divin'-log lays sunk and fergot. And I stray down the banks whare the trees ust to be-- But never again will theyr shade shelter me! And I wish in my sorrow I could strip to the soul, And dive off in my grave like, the old swimmin'-hole. Though Mr. Riley is no longer with us, he still has the same big place in our hearts. Why do we love him so? Is it not because he was able to reach our hearts as few have done; because he was able in all his poems to speak the word that we needed most? James Whitcomb Riley was born at Greenfield, Indiana, in 1853. His father was a lawyer and farmer combined. While he did the legal work of the village, he also owned a farm at the edge of town. As he was a good speaker he was in constant demand in that part of the state to speak on all kinds of occasions. Generally, on these trips, he took young James along; thus it was that the lad acquired a desire to travel that it took years of his after life to satisfy. It was from his mother that James received his talent for writing poetry. Though never a poet, she was exceedingly apt, as were all her people, in writing rhymes. The beautiful tributes that Riley, later in life, paid his mother show that she always understood and helped him.